


Not Her Nature

by quakinginmystylishboots



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Gen, Minor Character Death, POV Skye | Daisy Johnson, Season/Series 07 Spoilers, Speculation, Spoilers for season 7 up to the 7x10 promo, mildly graphic description of minor character's corpse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:55:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25570096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quakinginmystylishboots/pseuds/quakinginmystylishboots
Summary: Tasked with staying behind at the Lighthouse to protect her mother, Daisy has a talk with Jiaying about powers, Inhumans and Kora. Spoilers for the 7x10 promo.
Relationships: Jiaying & Skye | Daisy Johnson
Comments: 8
Kudos: 54





	Not Her Nature

**Author's Note:**

> Bit of a speculative fic on what might happen in 7x10, likely to be shot to hell by the actual episode which is why I'm posting it even though I should have left it marinate a bit more, I feel. I definitely took some liberties with Jiaying's characterization and backstory. Maybe Daisy's, too, come to think of it. Anyway! Marvel owns it, I just play with it. Also, not a native speaker, so advanced apologies when language and grammar go weird.

Unwrapping the MRE with the outdated, from her perspective, S.H.I.E.L.D. logo, Daisy couldn't help a little grimace. She was hardly a fussy eater – growing up in the system, living in a van and now dealing with a semi apocalyptic crisis every Wednesday really taught the value of adaptability – but the damn things had enough bad associations to make her regret not spending a few more minutes in the pantry, digging for something else.

They looked exactly the same as the ones they had found in storage in the Lighthouse when they had traveled back from the post-apocalyptic future to their then present, which was actually their past now, but in the future, except maybe not anymore, and wow, if that train of thought didn't do a number on her already developing headache.

Time traveling-induced headache or not, the field ration was just as tasteless as its decades old counterparts they'd had around those very frayed weeks she _really_ preferred not to think about.

It hadn't been the years, then. Just their nature.

Noticing the coffee pot in this new but actually old Lighthouse's command center was cold, she casually used her powers to heat it up in seconds and poured herself a cup.

“So that's your gift.”

Daisy jumped. Some super spy she was. Good thing May wasn't here to see it.

Her mother was standing behind her, a serene expression on her unmarred visage, with just a hint of curiosity and amusement. God, this was weird.

“Forgive the intrusion, I didn't mean to startle you.”

“No, it's alright. I'm supposed to guard you, anyway”. Daisy shrugged, sipping on her newly re-heated coffee. Almost as bad as the field ration. She fished for more sugar.

“It didn't help the taste, did it?” said Jiaying, with the faint of a smile. Daisy chuckled.

“Nope. I probably should have made a fresh batch. There's tea, though...I can heat up the water if you'd like?”

“How do you do that?”

“It's vibrations. I can sense them and manipulate them”, she explained, keeping it basic, because it was a fair bit more than that.

“You vibrate the water molecules and that produces heat” her mother nodded, understanding not quite replacing curiosity. She didn't follow up on her offer of tea, so Daisy went back to her unappealing meal. Jiaying's presence wasn't improving it.

Logically, she understood, and better than ever now, how what her mother had gone through had broken her... but, five years later, the betrayal still felt raw. As the nagging doubts. Her biological parents had been monsters. She had told herself they had become that way, that it wasn't their nature and therefore not hers, either. Yet the part of her that never really dealt with heartbreak and just run away from it, sometimes literally, hadn't fully moved past it.

“Any word from your friends?”, Jiaying asked, bringing her back to their present situation, hunkered down at the Lighthouse while the team was flying to Afterlife.

“Not yet. They should be landing in about an hour”.

Worry and frustration revealed the lie of Jiyaing's serene countenance.

“I wish we didn't stay behind. My people are in terrible danger and I'm hiding”. She said, as much to Daisy as to the empty room.

“Generals don't fight on the front lines.”

“We are not an army.”

“We were meant to be.”

As soon as she said it, Daisy mentally kicked herself. She shouldn't even be _mentioning_ any of this but the entire situation was throwing her off balance and then some. Meeting her own mother, five years before she was supposed to be born. Her own mother, who she had wished for the first 26 years of her life. Her own mother, who had tried to kill her. Her own mother, whose skeleton she had dug up in a desperate attempt to save the person dearest to her. Sometimes, Daisy seriously wondered _how_ her life was even real.

She was also not a fan of the “staying behind” thing. As she had told Mack. Repeatedly. Unsuccessfully.

She refocused on Jiaying.

“It's not what we chose to be. Our people have lived secluded for centuries. We have kept ourselves from the world, never involving in its troubles. The world is not inclined to return such courtesy, it seems.” Her mother's piercing gaze found hers again. “You and Elena, is that what you are, though? Soldiers?”

“We help people.” If the older woman recognized the defensiveness in her tone, she didn't comment on it. Her eyes once again turned to the room that was buzzing with 1980s computer noises and a cacophony of contrasting vibrations Daisy was becoming acutely aware of.

“When I was younger – Jiaying started, her tone more wistful than Daisy ever remembered – I thought our gifts should be shared, used to help the world. We can do so many wonderful things.... but they are also dangerous in the wrong hands, and there are _always_ wrong hands. Yet, it is comforting – she added, looking back to Daisy with a smile – to know that our people can be warriors for the benefit of all”.

Daisy felt herself nodding. That sounded...nice. Or maybe it did because of who was saying it. Jiaying's smile turned pensive.

“I have lived a long life and I could live an even longer one. Experience is important but so are new perspectives. My daughter... when she was born, I had wished it for her. To one day lead our people where I couldn't take them. I feel so naive now. I did everything wrong”.

Daisy wondered idly when it had become so hard to control her heart rate. Or breathe.

“I don't think you should blame yourself”, she offered tentatively.

“Shouldn't I? I wasn't able to help her control her gift and I couldn't make her believe she was safe with me, that I would protect her, that I loved her too much for anything else. It is my failure. It is my responsibility”.

“People are responsible for their own choices.” Daisy shot back brusquely, perhaps too much so. If the conversation had been uncomfortable before...

“What if the choice they have isn't fair? Her gift hurt her when she kept it inside and hurt others when she couldn't. What would you do if that was your choice?”

Daisy bit her tongue, holding back the snarky reply – _I wouldn't follow a sadistic bastard looking to destroy everything_ – on the tip of it. She stared at Jiaying, seeing the pain of a parent who feels they have failed their child. A whirlwind of conflicting emotions – bitter hurt, anger, hopeful relief, longing – engulfed her and almost overwhelmed her. Compassion won out.

“When I first got my powers, I wasn't able to control them and it would hurt me to try. My... family... they didn't know how to help me. Eventually I found people who could – _and she was my family, too_ – but they weren't as... well-meaning... as I had thought – _you manipulated me, lied to me_ – I was blind to it for a time – _until someone had to die for me to see the truth_ – but it wasn't too late – _not for me, at least_ – it's not too late for your daughter, either”.

“Thank you, Agent Jones. You have a kind heart”.

Daisy felt herself staring again, rooted in place, her meal forgotten. The blaring of sirens broke the spell.

“We've been breached”.

***********************

Nathaniel Malick was dead. His body, twisted, broken and shriveled, was currently stored in a black bag, in the Lighthouse's morgue. The battle had been brutal, laced with a yearning to _hurt_ her foe Daisy hadn't felt since facing Hive. In the end, she hadn't killed him. Towering over him, his limbs broken, she had hesitated, questioning her reasons. Then Jiaying, who she had thought he had murdered, had touched him. And it was over.

“This is how I heal”, she had explained, apologetic. Daisy had just nodded, focusing on slowing her heart down.

Later, before the Afterlife survivors were flown to the village in Hunan where Jiyaing had been born and where Daisy would, too, if the events of the past few days hadn't irreparably altered her mother's life trajectory, they met again – _for the last time?_ – in the Lighthouse's hangar.

“I knew your gift felt familiar”, Jiaying told her, no physical trace of her recent brush with death. Malick had spilled the beans, one last attempt to fuck with her life.

“I'm sorry I lied to you. We are trying to protect the future” _What's left of it, anyway_.

“I understand... but I am glad to know the truth. And to have met you. Your story, about your powers...”

“I made it up”, Daisy replied, too quickly. “I'm sorry. And please don't ask me... anything else. ”

“You were being kind. Thank you. And I won't. It's enough to feel hopeful again”.

Daisy stayed very still, willing her face into the kind of unemotional mask May was a master at but she had never quite managed.

Jiaying didn't question it, letting her eyes linger on her surroundings. “I had never taken an unwilling life before. It's... worse.”

Daisy understood that feeling. “The world is better without him. Believe me.”

Her mother nodded, mirroring her conviction. “I do. Your sister... I won't ask you what I know you cannot promise me. Just... she is young and she is lost.”

“I know. I will try.”

“Thank you.”

Watching the Quinjet take off, Daisy felt a measure of hope, too. It wasn't nature. And maybe not being born wouldn't be so bad if it meant it wouldn't be life, either.

**Author's Note:**

> I imagine decades old MREs would be uneatable but it's S.H.I.E.L.D., they have cell phones batteries that last for months and time travel, so! Oh, and if there's food in everything I've posted so far it's not a coincidence. I don't think Daisy's had an actual break from one crisis or another since the hiatus between S1 and S2 and I WORRY. So at least she's eating, you know? Even if not very well... xD


End file.
